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?iri ERRATA Page 225. Beginning with reference numeral 4there is an error in each of the reference numerals through number 55. To correct the references: On page 225, paragraph 1, against the word "appearances" place thenumeral 4. On pages 225-265 read 4 as 5, 5 as 6, and so on through number 55. This will make the reference numerals read from 1 to 57 in order, and correspond with the numerals in the Ger- man original, the French original, and the translation of the French. ... This Kepi ""WO EEKS ] < t . ONLY, and is subject to a fine of FIVE "ENTS a day thereafter. It is DUE on the / indicated ^'v^w: Plan of the City of New Bern. North Carolina, by Baron Christoph von Graffenried t7 / / _; . . e i . 'l >{ ^f-r^yf^dcr J7J0 :^A\&0*&& ^w $£«ur m^-f-Aff-ifort-lif* \ % X e? i "' . * v •i. " '"'* \r** ' -: PUBLICATIONS OFTHE NORTH CAROLINA HISTORICAL COMMISSION CHRISTOPH VON GRAFFENRIED'S ACCOUNT OF THE FOUNDING OF NEW BERN EDITED WITH AN HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION AND AN ENGLISH TRANSLATION BY VINCENT H. TODD, PH.D. UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS IN COOPERATION WITH JULIUS GOEBEL, Ph.D., Professor of Germanic Languages UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS Raleigh Edwards & Broughton Printing Co. State Printers 1920 THE NORTH CAROLINA HISTORICAL COMMISSION J. BRYAN GRIMES, Chairman W. J. PEELE D. H. HILL M. C. S. NOBLE THOMAS M. PITTMAN R. D. W. CONNOR, Secretary, Raleigh CONTENTS Pkeface -- ^ Historical Introduction 7 H2 Bibliography __ -- - - H5 German Version English Translation of the German Version 219 French Version 321 English Translation of the Frenc—h Version 357 Vocabulary._ -- 393 Index ^19 o s PREFACE A carefully prepared and conservative computation made within the last ten years gives the surprising result that, of our white population there are at least twenty-seven per cent of German birth or extraction, while those of English origin number but thirty per cent. With such a proportion of Germans, is it not strange that almost nothing is said in our histories about this great element of our population; about the causes that induced them to leave their homes; about the circumstances of their first settlements; about their in- fluence upon the growth of our common culture? The reason of this lies, partly in the undeveloped provincial character of American historiography, partly in the fact that American History was first written by men from New England. They wrote of the things with which they were most familiar, their own Puritan commonwealths and the institutions developed from them. Biased by provincial prejudices they overlooked other events of equally great importance, so that their histories read like a one-sided glorifi- cation of their ancestors. A very powerful contributory cause for this discrimination is the fact that the Germans made their settlements comparatively late, and for the most part avoided New England. By the time the first permanent settlements were made at Germantown, near Philadelphia (1683) New England had passed through some of its most epoch-making experiences. The colonies about Massachusetts Bay, Connecticut and Rhode Island had been settled and their characteristic institutions, which have come down to our own time, were becoming fixed in laws and customs of the people. American historiography as first conceived by the New England historians has since followed the same or similar lines, and until recently when the German-Americans themselves took up the work, very little, in general, was known about the early life of this portion of our population. It is to be hoped that this regrettable division in matters of historical truth will be done away with, and since no one nationality can rightfully claim all the honor of having made America what it is, Germans as well as Puritans and Cavaliers will come to be recog- nized for what they are or have done, and not be excluded from consideration for what they have not done.1 To illustrate: It was not a German woman's pig to which we traced the bicameral system of 1Thereissome assurancethatthishoped forchange of attitudewillcome,when a historianlike CahnadnanpipnrgeciinathiivseHniostticoeryofofthteheGeUrnmiatendsSitnaPteesnn(svyollv.aInIi,a.pagIensa11f6o,o3t95n,ot4e04onff)paggivees40a5hraetmheernteixotnesndtehde manuscriptsonwhichthispaperhasbeenbased. 6 North Carolina Historical Commission Government in Massachusetts; but it is to the German settlers at Schoharie that we, in a large measure, owe the fortunate outcome ofthe French and Indianwar, for it was theywho kept the Six Nations from joining the French, when such an event would have spelled disaster to the New York and New England colonies; they did not give us theocracies from which a doubtful ideal of the state eventu- ally evolved; but they helped to give us freedom of conscience, the very corner-stone of modern politics, and it is to the German printer in New York that we owe an untrammeled public press. Who shall say which is the worthier? It is not sufficient then to know that in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries a large number of Germans came to America, and made or tried to make certain settlements. We want to go further and learn about their life and work and be able to appreciate them as we do the other pioneers. It is for this reason that a study of Baron Christoph von Graffenried's settlements may be consid- ered worth while. This colony in North Carolina would have consisted of only a few Swiss adventurers but for the events of the year 1709. These enlarged the scope, increased the prestige of the undertaking, gave the leadership to one of the few ever to possess a title of nobility in Locke's new American order, made this pioneer of several Swiss undertakings the nearest approach to Locke's ideal that ever existed in America, and taking it out of its isolation, made it a part of the great German migration of 1709; a consideration of which may prop- erly precede the study of Graffenried's own adventures. Since a man should be judged by his intentions and by the times in which he lived, as well as by the actual results of his efforts, it has seemed well to quote from or make references to the writings of con- temporaries wherever possible. 1 For instance, his expectation of becoming rich from silver mines in Maryland or Virginia seemed to us absurd because we know there is no silver in those parts in pay- ing quantities; but if we find, that in his day, everyone believed that there was silver to be found there, and if we remember that the Secretary of the London Royal Society in 1669 urged Governor John Winthrop to look for mines in Connecticut and if necessary to "employ dogs of the best scent"2 for this purpose, Graffenried'sper- sistency in searching for silver takes on a different aspect. ProceedingsMass. Hist.Society, 1878,pages229-240. HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION